


I Wish Heaven Had a Phone

by orphan_account



Series: snktober 2020 [9]
Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alternate Universe - Celebrity, Fluff, M/M, Meet-Cute
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-21
Updated: 2020-10-21
Packaged: 2021-03-08 17:26:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,678
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27140383
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/orphan_account
Summary: As soon as he had seen the man’s acting in a dystopian superhero film that had debuted five years back, Armin knew he was in for the long haul.--snktober day twenty-one: actor au
Relationships: Armin Arlert/Eren Yeager
Series: snktober 2020 [9]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1946416
Comments: 14
Kudos: 107
Collections: SNKTOBER Month 2020





	I Wish Heaven Had a Phone

Armin wouldn’t call himself an obsessive fan—no, not at all. 

But when his favorite actor of all time, a man notorious for being absolutely terrible with social media, finally tweeted something, he knew he had to act quickly.

“Hello,” Eren Jaeger, winner of the Academy Awards for Best Actor for two years straight, had tweeted at approximately 6:03 a.m. to his nearly five million followers. 

By some miracle, some omniscient intervention, Armin had been awake, curled up in bed and scrolling through Twitter before starting the arduous process of getting ready for the day.

It wasn’t like Armin held any hope of being noticed by Eren or anything. There was just something in his heart that told him he had to reply to Eren’s tweet, though not with an overly excited reply that had one too many words capitalized.

While he had a Bachelor’s in English and a Master’s in Rhetoric and Composition, he could not find the right words for his tweet or to describe the adoration he had for Eren. As soon as he had seen the man’s acting in a dystopian superhero film that had debuted five years back, Armin knew he was in for the long haul.

After a few seconds of panicked contemplation, Armin finally settled on replying with a bright, “Hi!” and a picture of his adorable Corgi attached. 

Darcy, his bright-eyed and floppy-tongued Corgi, had been rolled over in the picture, waiting expectantly for enthusiastic bellyrubs. It was quite possibly the most adorable picture Armin had, and attaching it to his reply to Eren was like a peasant offering the best crops of his harvest to the king.

Taking a deep breath and closing his eyes, Armin hit the blue reply button and tossed his phone away from him, squealing. 

There was no time for fanboying when he had work to do. Copyediting was a full-time job, and only the strongest of coffees (with whipped cream and butterscotch) would keep him going throughout the day.

After showering, brushing his teeth, and tossing on his favorite pair of yoga pants and his oversized college hoodie, Armin was nearly ready to go. He knew he was forgetting something… 

His keys? No, already in his pocket. His phone? In his hand. 

His whirring thoughts were interrupted by a soft yipping at his feet. 

“Aw, Darcy!” Armin exclaimed, bending down to lovingly rub his dog’s head. “Let me get your leash, okay?”

Darcy responded by howling happily, and Armin could feel something bright, like the sun peeking out from a distant horizon, curling in the corners of his chest.

\--

The cafe that Armin liked to frequent was a family-owned joint in a calmer neighborhood of Los Angeles, the sidewalks bustling with people holding tote bags and sporting athleisure fashion all day long. He was a regular there, having discovered the quaint cafe with its hanging floral terrariums and cottagecore charm last year when he was in the throes of his Master’s thesis.

The friendly barista Sasha knew his order by heart, and, if she snuck a little extra whipped cream on his drink on days he looked a little ragged, then nobody needed to know. He always stuffed a handful of crumpled bills in the tip jar, anyway, each and every time he visited.

That day, Armin chose to work at one of the tables outside, taking advantage of the mild warmth of a mid-October day. The light bustle of the city served as a calming backdrop as he opened his laptop and set to work, his freelance projects already neatly organized in folders on the screen.

A few hours passed, and Armin was so engrossed in his writing for a niche food blog that he didn’t notice anything was wrong until Darcy started yowling.

Startled, he looked up just in time to see a huge German Shepherd barreling toward Darcy, ears perked, eyes keen, jaws agape with its pink tongue poking out eagerly.

Heart pounding in his chest, Armin barely managed to scoop his precious child out of the way of the slobbering dog. 

The German Shepherd didn’t seem fazed at all by his intervention, and instead settled for pawing at his legs and jumping up at Armin’s arms to get at Darcy, who barked, whimpering at first but steadily growing more energetic. The Shepherd barked back joyfully, panting all the while.

After the initial scare, Armin realized that the German Shepherd had likely been extremely excited to meet another dog; still, though, that didn’t prevent him from burying his face in Darcy’s fur and rubbing soothing circles over his back.

Not bothering to look up at the sound of hurried footsteps, Armin scolded, no real heat behind his words, “You should be more careful with your dog.”

“I’m so sorry,” a strangely familiar voice said to his right. “She loves meeting new friends.”

With his blood rushing in his ears and shock coiling in his stomach, Armin slowly lifted his face to look up into the eyes of Eren Jaeger.

It was quite possible that Armin was hallucinating or mistaking the poor stranger for his celebrity crush. The man had a cap and hoodie partially obscuring his face, but that didn’t stop his shoulder-length brown hair from spilling out the sides or the green of his eyes from piercing straight into Armin’s poor, flustered heart.

“I—I, um,” Armin said, quite intelligently. “She does seem friendly.”

Eren smiled, a tad awkwardly, an expression that was unlike the blazing confidence he had on the silver screen. “Sorry again about that. Your corgi is adorable, by the way. Looks kinda familiar…”

When Armin didn’t respond, his mind too busy combusting, Eren backtracked. “I mean, sorry, I didn’t mean that in a weird way or anything! I just, well, there was this picture of a corgi someone sent me, and yours looks just like it.”

Before Armin could say anything, the very same picture of Darcy that Armin had commented on Eren’s tweet was being shoved in his face. 

“Ah, yeah, that’s… that’s my Darcy,” Armin replied, voice shaky, palms sweating. Darcy seemed to notice his owner’s state of mild bewilderment and shuffled his face up to lick at Armin’s cheeks comfortingly.

Eren’s face brightened, the awkward set to his jaw forgotten. “Darcy! That’s such a cute name! My morning was honestly so shitty. Like, I woke up early to gym but I couldn’t even bench 355 for some reason.” 

Armin privately thought that Eren’s figure looked just fine, but he didn’t say that out loud, choosing instead to let the man continue with his passionate explanation. “Guess my time off didn’t help… but anyway, yeah! I saw the picture of your dog, and it really made my day better, so thank you.”

“I’m happy to hear it,” Armin stuttered out, feeling like he’d perhaps never woken up at all this morning. Was he still dreaming? It had to be a dream. “Uh, sorry if this is weird to ask, but are you… are you Eren Jaeger?”

Eren grinned easily at him, teeth beautifully white, the question seemingly coming as no surprise. “Yep!” He pointed to his german shepherd, who had taken to gnawing playfully at his ripped jeans. “And this is Destroyer—sorry, her name’s weird; I let one of my castmates pick it.” Eren paused, realization dawning in his eyes. “Wait, are you a fan?”

Armin nodded, not quite trusting himself with words. 

It wasn’t a dream. It was Eren Jaeger in the flesh, resplendent in all his six foot tall glory, trying to look like the average person going out for a stroll in the park. 

Except he wasn’t some run-of-the-mill Joe Schmoe, he was an Oscar award winning actor with a net worth enough to buy Armin’s life ten times over and still have enough change left for a private island or two. 

Armin took a deep breath, counted to three in his head, and relaxed. Eren was still a human being. It wouldn’t do for Armin to make him uncomfortable by letting his inner feral fanboy loose.

“Yeah, I am,” Armin said, owning up to his vices but refusing to act like the besotted fan he truly was. “But don’t worry, I’m not gonna beg you for an autograph or your phone number or anything like that. I have standards.”

Eren’s eyes widened as if caught off guard, and Armin worried for one excruciating second about whether he should’ve made that joke. Then, Eren broke into bright, exuberant laughter, and Armin’s heart lifted so far up in his chest he thought it might float away like a balloon. 

“What’s your name?” Eren asked, leaning forward, his eyes bright and keen for an answer. 

For Armin’s answer, specifically. Armin thought vaguely that the caffeine he had inhaled just an hour earlier was probably not the only reason he was feeling lightheaded.

“Armin,” Armin replied, because he definitely had a functioning brain and two degrees in English composition that he knew how to use. 

“Well then, Armin,” Eren said, an infuriatingly handsome smirk on his face. “If you keep sending me pics of Darcy, you can have my phone number. Is that a deal?”

Take everything back; this was definitely a dream. You did not meet celebrities in coffee shops. You most certainly did not meet celebrities in coffee shops after posting about your dog (even if he was, admittedly, really damn cute) and getting ambushed by an overly enthusiastic German Shepherd. 

And, even if you did, there was no way the celebrity in question would be Eren fucking Jaeger, looking like he’d walked straight out of a GQ cover despite wearing the equivalent of a college student’s struggle outfit.

Darcy’s little yip broke him out of his rose-tinted reverie, and Armin cleared his throat, warmth trickling up his neck and onto his cheeks. “I think he says yes,” Armin replied, unlocking his phone and handing it over. “And I can’t say no to him.”

Eren’s genuine megawatt smile was much more brilliant in person than on the big screen.


End file.
